The distribution of information is being revolutionized before our very eyes. Wide area networks ("WAN's"), notably the Internet, are assuming the role of "information superhighways" and are distributing electronic embodiments of mail, textbooks, magazines, advertisements, and even audio and video clips around the world. Herein, the term "document" denotes and includes any and all such electronic content, generically.
FIG. 1 conceptually illustrates the basic architecture of a "client-server" WAN like the Internet. Servers 10a-n form the backbone of the WAN. The servers are interconnected by a telecommunications infrastructure and exchange information in the form of one or more recognized protocols, such as protocol 30. For example, in the case of the Internet, network protocols include FTP, for file transfer, and Telnet, for remote log-in. Each server effectively represents and services its one or more "clients." Basically, the clients are the ultimate sources and targets of underlying information, while the servers dispatch and receive messages across the WAN in compliance with network protocols. Each client may correspond to a single user's computer, or may itself be hierarchically complex and may comprise a further sub-network or collection of numerous computers, such as the well-known, proprietary sub-networks of America Online, CompuServe, and Prodigy. In this way, information of any kind can be distributed worldwide in electronic form at telecommunications speeds.
One of the most rapidly expanding aspects of the Internet is the World Wide Web (the "Web"). The Web is comprised of those Internet servers (and their clients) able to support the Hyper-Text Transfer Protocol, better known as "http." The Web allows documents and graphical materials to be interlinked by means of "hypertext" (or more generally, hypermedia) document elements. When a user utilizes a cursor control device to select and "click" on a hypermedia item in one document, a related document will automatically be accessed as identified by that link. For example, FIG. 2 illustrates a simple example of a popular Web document known as a "home page." Home page 40 includes title 42, graphic image 44, instructional text 48, and list of bullet items 46a-c. Selections 46a-c are each hypertext. A Web hypermedia item is actually encoded with a Uniform Resource Locator ("URL") tag, which literally addresses a document located on a remote network server. If a client of a Web server is equipped with suitable "browser" software, then a user of that client can point and click on any one of the hypermedia items within home page 40, and an http request to view the associated, linked content residing elsewhere on the Internet will automatically be generated and dispatched by the client's server to the appropriate Internet server which "hosts" the linked document. The linked material will then automatically be retrieved and ultimately displayed on the client. Http further includes the Hyper-Text Markup Language ("html"), which may be used to specify a certain layout structure for Web documents, e.g., specifying subsections of the document as a title, image, list, etc. Html specifications are interpreted by a client's browser, resulting in an appropriate display on the particular client's computer platform. A survey and discussion of many popular Web browsers is provided in the Feb. 7, 1995, issue of PC Magazine ("PC Magazine"), at pages 173-196.
An important challenge that must be addressed, especially in light of the burgeoning expansion and popularity of the Internet and the Web, is how best to facilitate the authoring and publishing of hypermedia documents on the Web. Many large and small publishers of content--such as newspaper and magazine publishers, for example--wish to make their content available in on-line form to subscribers. However, this opportunity presents a major bottleneck, because high-quality development platforms and authoring tools have not yet been developed that adequately facilitate the authoring and publishing of hypermedia on a distributed WAN like the Web. A summary of the primary limitations of current Internet and Web publishing tools follows:
1. Current publishing tools are typically not fully network-integrated. Browsers or other "cruiseware" help users view existing WAN content, but do not generally support authoring of new WAN content. Current authoring tools, on the other hand, are typically either "stand-alone" local products, or at best offer a limited bridge to WAN access such that authoring and WAN navigation remain fundamentally non-integrated processes.
For example, in order to publish a document on a WAN, it is typically necessary to edit documents in a local storage context using authoring tools, and thereafter manually copy the documents to a WAN server. Manual copying is often tedious and inconvenient, especially where a publisher frequently publishes a large quantity of content from diverse sources, including text files, graphics images, video and sound clips, etc. Yet, current authoring tools generally provide little assistance with this chore.
The non-integrated nature of current authoring tools presents other difficulties and limitations as well. For example, it is not generally possible to "open" multiple WAN documents for editing and to transfer text, images, and URL's among those documents in the seamless fashion as is presently done with typical word processors for local computer documents. As another example, current Web authoring tools generally do not provide full WYSIWYG ("What You See Is What You Get") feedback as to html markups and hypermedia links. In other words, the creation and editing of documents is typically performed in a purely local context; html and URL codes must then be separately tested in a serial fashion, by loading the document into a WAN browser or the like. This serial, iterative process is highly inefficient.
2. Current WAN publishing tools provide little assistance with managing collections of documents. Although the World Wide Web is famous for supporting hypermedia document links, current tools provide scant support for maintaining and operating on collections of related documents as a group. Much progress is needed in this area. For example, an integrated publishing environment should preferably allow users to visually navigate through collections of interconnected documents; to upload, download, and transport collections of documents from one WAN location to another as a group; and to set access privileges or other attributes for a WAN collection as a group. Current tools generally fall far short of these objectives.
3. Current publishing tools provide little assistance with content-based indexing and retrieval. Current navigational tools, such as browsers, provide very little assistance with systematically organizing and searching the information content contained within the numerous sites comprising a network like the Internet. Clearly, as the volume of both information and traffic on the Internet continues to explode, publishers need to be able to make their content available to subscribers in an intelligently organized fashion that facilitates uniform, content-driven search and access.
4. Current publishing tools provide little assistance with asset management. For commercial publishers of proprietary material like newspapers or periodicals, asset management is critical. In other words, publishers need to be able to control and limit access to their WAN documents, and to keep track of usage for billing and other purposes. Yet, currently available tools for WAN publishing generally ignore this area almost completely.
5. Current publishing tools do not address the creation of application programs. For on-line network publishing to realize its full potential, publishers will want to do more than simply dump passive, one-way content onto the Internet. They will want to provide application programs allowing network users to take advantage of interactive on-line services such as subscribing to a publication, registering for a conference, or perhaps even more exotic applications like participating in multi-player games contests. Current network publishing and authoring tools largely ignore this area.
Accordingly, there is a great need for a new development platform for distributed publishing that overcomes the various limitations described above. This need is especially pronounced and important in view of the rapid expansion of interest in the Internet and the Web, and the tremendous economic opportunities presently available to publishers if a suitable development platform can be provided. Recently, authoring tools have begun to emerge, which attack some of the foregoing problems in piecemeal fashion. See PC Magazine at pp. 110-196. However, there remains a great need for a comprehensive solution to the problems described, and especially for an authoring/publishing tool that is truly and fully network-integrated.